


(Softly) Don't

by IlliterateBuckyBarnes



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, M/M, Tatted Bucky, bucky is a Gay Disaster
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-10
Updated: 2019-11-10
Packaged: 2021-01-27 03:47:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,421
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21385576
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IlliterateBuckyBarnes/pseuds/IlliterateBuckyBarnes
Summary: Dear apartment 12B,Please stop playing Celtic step music every night. Or if you must, please use headphones.Everyone on the floor can hear it, and most of us have class or work early in the morning. Your actions are despicable and you aren’t even the one losing sleep.Sincerely,Apartment 12COr: the one where Bucky can't sleep and Steve likes Irish music
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers
Kudos: 66





	(Softly) Don't

**Author's Note:**

> This is my very first fic so uh, go easy on me

“’Your actions are despicable and you aren’t even the one losing sleep over them’?” Bucky looks up at Sam for confirmation, who shakes his head.  
“No, no, you gotta take the ‘over them’ off. It’s more dramatic that way”. Bucky nods, ripping out a new sheet of paper from the spiral notebook and rewriting the note.  
Dear apartment 12B,  
Please stop playing Celtic step music every night. Or if you must, please use headphones.Everyone on the floor can hear it, and most of us have class or work early in the morning. Your actions are despicable and you aren’t even the one losing sleep.  
Sincerely,  
Apartment 12C  
“That should definitely get his attention” Bucky says, putting the cap back on his pen. Sam just grins.  
“You really are a drama queen, Barnes”  
Bucky shrugs, “I just want to be able to get some sleep,” Though deep down, he knew Sam was right.  
**  
Coming home from a far too long art history lecture, Bucky barely noticed the yellow sticky note placed on his door. He ripped it off eagerly, expecting the note to be some sort of apology from 12B, though once he saw the neat red writing, he realized he was out of luck.  
James, Sam locked both himself and his phone out of the apartment. You can retrieve him at your earliest convenience.  
Bucky pulls his keys away from the door, walking away from the nap he had wanted to take and toward Nat’s apartment, 12A. 

He had only gotten out one knock before Sam yanked open the door, relief written all over his face.  
“Man, thank you! I’ve been stuck helping Nat study for her Russian exam for four hours,” Sam visibly shudders as he tells this to Bucky, looking ready to cry.  
“If you’ve been here that long, why didn’t you just have Nat call me between classes?” Bucky steps around Sam to step into Nat’s apartment. Surrounded by a flurry of flash cards and notes, she barely looks up at him. He bends down to pet Liho, Natasha’s technically contraband cat.  
“If he was stupid enough to lock his phone in there, I wasn’t going to let him use mine,” Bucky looks up from Liho to roll his eyes at Nat.  
“Isn’t four hours a little excessive?”  
“No. This exam is worth 20% of my grade, if I fail this I’m dead.” Bucky just nods at that, giving Liho one last scratch on the ears before standing up and ushering Sam to the door.  
“See you tomorrow night?” Bucky calls over his shoulder toward Nat, who gives him a thumbs up.  
**  
That night, Bucky woke up with a string of curses on his tongue directed toward the loud music blaring through the wall. He banged his fist on the wall, knowing it’s useless but wanting to try anyway. As expected, there is no change in volume. Bucky groans, rolling over and trying to drown the music out with his pillow. Just as he resigns himself to a night without sleep, he remembers Nat’s Russian exam, and he knows that she’s not going to be able to sleep with this.  
Sighing, Bucky gets up, stuffing his feet into slippers before quietly making his way out of the apartment, toward 12C. Despite his annoyance, Bucky had never actually went and asked the guy at 12C to quiet down. He didn’t want to make waves, and he figured he could eventually get used to it. Any other night, he would have just tried to muddle through, even putting in ear plugs if he had to, but he knew there would be no way for Natasha to sleep through this. She’d been stressing over this exam for weeks, and he wasn’t about to let this punk keep her from acing it.  
Taking a breath, he knocked on the door, then knocked again harder when there was no response. Finally, the music shuts off and he hears the click of the door unlocking.  
Bucky had seen the guy that lives in 12C before in the halls, and there was no denying that the guy was hot, big, blond, and muscly. Honestly, that was part of the reason why Bucky had never tried to approach the guy, because he knew that he would end up a fumbling mess and would forget to even say anything about the music. This time, Bucky was preparing himself, steeling himself to keep it together long enough to get his point across. This is for Natasha, he reminds himself.  
All of Bucky’s mental preparation could never have prepared him for the sight in front of him when the door to 12C opens.  
The first thing he sees are abs, his eyes moving up across the planes and valleys of the mans broad chest, wide shoulders leading to a long neck, up further to what really shocked Bucky. Tired blue eyes, still heavy with sleep. Looking again, Bucky sees that the man’s blond hair is pushed flat on one side and puffed up on the other, and his plaid sleep pants are wrinkled.  
Somehow, this guy was managing to sleep through all that music.  
“Uh,” the blond starts, getting cut off by a yawn, “Can I help you?”  
Christ, Bucky thinks, even this guy’s voice is sexy.  
Bucky stands up a little straighter, rolling his shoulders back.  
“Um, yeah, hi.” Bucky mentally kicks himself. “Um, your music is a little loud, so like, is there any way you could, y’know, turn it down a little?” Bucky winces at how stupid he sounds and runs his left hand through his hair.  
The blond’s eyes follow Bucky’s hand, his eyes moving along the tattoo that takes up his entire arm, metal plates drawn across his skin.  
“Oh, yeah, sorry. I didn’t realize it was so loud, and, well this is kind of embarrassing, but I don’t really know how to turn it down.” The blond blushes slightly, his pale cheeks turning the lightest shade of pink.  
“Well, uh, do you need like, help?” Real smooth Barnes, real smooth.  
Bucky expects to be politely turned down, expects to be sent back to his apartment to wallow in embarrassment and move out in the middle of the night so he never has to face this big, beautiful man again.  
“Yeah sure, if you think you can figure it out,” the larger man steps aside, allowing Bucky to come in.  
**  
“What the fuck is this thing?” Bucky asks, staring wide-eyed at the thin strip of metal on the blond’s bookshelf. There were no obvious buttons on the strip, nothing to indicate a way to turn the volume down.  
“My friend, he’s an engineering major, made this for me.” The blond rubs at the back of his neck, a habit that makes him seem much smaller than his hulking height. “I had told him I was missing the old Irish songs my mom used to play at night, and he just made me this”  
“Why didn’t you just play it on your phone?” Bucky asks, chuckling softly.  
The blond blushes again, replying, “I don’t know, Tony just wanted to make this, I think,”  
Bucky nods, though he doesn’t completely understand what’s going on. He runs his hand over the strip, making Irish music blare throughout the apartment. They both scream, Bucky slamming his hands back over the strip until it finally stops.  
“So, I think your friend made you a speaker that only has one volume,” Bucky says, looking from the strip to the blond, and Bucky realizes he doesn’t even know the guys name.  
“Yeah, that sounds like Tony,” the blond chuckles, reflecting on some memory of their friendship, “I can’t even be surprised”  
“But, uh, I’ll stop playing it so late at night. Believe it or not, as loud as it was it still helped me sleep,”  
“Well, maybe you can ask your friend Tony to put in a volume control,” Bucky smiles, shifting on his feet.  
“Yeah, I’ll have to.” The blond smiles back at him, and Bucky gets lost in those blue eyes.  
Bucky smiles again, nodding and turning to leave before it starts to get too awkward.  
“Hey, wait,” The blond calls out. Bucky turns around.  
“Yeah?”  
“I never caught your name,”  
“It’s Bucky,”  
“Steve.”  
“It was nice to meet you, Steve,”  
“You too, Bucky”  
Bucky turns again to leave, getting to the door before he turns around again.  
“Hey Steve?”  
“Yeah?”  
“D’you wanna, maybe get coffee come time?”  
The blond blushes again, before responding, “Yeah, I’d like that”


End file.
